Persephone's Curse
by Humuhumunukunukuapua'a
Summary: Persephone, living with Hades in the Underworld, tends to her garden full of things like Underworld flowers, and Pomegranates. When eaten in the Underworld, they trap the unlucky person in the Underworld forever. But what happens when she accidentally plants one in the mortal world? What happens when someone we all know eats one? Set after the war with Kronos. On hold.
1. Persephone's view

It was Persephone's favorite time of year- Spring. The time she was allowed to walk above the ground instead of underneath it, where she was trapped until this wonderful time of year. She sat quietly on top of a hill and made some bright blue and red flowers spring out of the ground around her. She sighed, thinking of how great it was to make flowers grow that had color, instead of wilted ones that were black and grey. Silently, she basked in the morning sun while watching camp Half-Blood on a nearby hill.

She was hidden by a small patch of thick trees, so that she could observe their morning routine without letting knowledge of her hiding place escape. Most of the demigods were already up, training and trying to hit each other with spears, or pressing attacks with their celestial bronze swords. Some were shooting targets at the archery range. _Apollo's kids,_ Persephone thought to herself. _Hopefully I Never have to listen to one of his 'haikus' again._

She watched them for awhile before turning to the lake. Only two figures were there, probably Athena's daughter Annabeth and Percy, Poseidon's son. He had accomplished a lot recently. Defeating Kronos is no small task. However, he also returned Zeus' lightning bolt, turned down godhood, and got himself a girlfriend. A daughter of Athena, no less. Said girlfriend was currently being doused with water by Percy, who began running when she drew her dagger.

Persephone chuckled to herself while she watched. Percy ran across the water, laughing as Annabeth tried to run across the water and ended up wading through it. _When they aren't being chased by monsters or struggling to save the world, they have a pretty good time._ She sighed, wishing she could say the same for herself for the year round, and pulled out something to eat. It was a pomegranate from the Underworld. _Oh, well._ She sighed again. _It's better than starving._ Even though they had ultimately led to her enslavement for half of the year, pomegranates still tasted good. And with that thought, she started eating it. She watched every once in awhile to see what the demigods were doing, but there wasn't much of a change.

As she finished the snack, she didn't notice the one seed that she had overlooked drop lightly onto the ground. She stood up and brushed herself off, before using the gods' method of teleportation to transport in blinding white light to another location, probably a garden that needed to be taken care of. If anyone had been watching, they would have easily overlooked the small red seed that had dropped alone onto the dirt.

This seed was not just a regular seed, though. It had come from the Underworld. If anyone had watched the small fruit very closely, if they had seen it at all, they would have known that the seed had already started to sprout. It was growing much faster than any plant should be able to. Before long, the seed had taken a firm grip of the ground with its roots. The tree started to grow. It only slowed down a little, and that night it had grown to be a foot high. Still, even through the night, it continued to grow. The next morning, it was three feet high and still growing strong. Nobody would guess the trouble that this small tree could cause.


	2. Sweet poison

Sorry it's been so long! I have a lot to do around this time. I love reading so much that I just forget to write! Enjoy!

 _ **~Percy~**_

Percy kept running around trying to get away from an angry Annabeth with a dagger.

"Seaweed Brain! Get back here!"

Percy chuckled and dived for the water. Instead of diving in, he started walking around on the water. When Annabeth attempted to follow, she sank beneath the waves. Knowing that she couldn't possibly catch Percy in his element, she settled for screaming at him from the shore.

"Percy Achilles Jackson! You get yourself over here right now, or I'll… I'll… "

"Brain me to death?" Percy offered.

Annabeth yelled in frustration while Connor Stoll jogged toward them. When he was nearly there, Percy called out to him.

"Hey Connor, where's your brother?" Seeing only one of them at a time worried him. When you saw only one, he would likely be luring the unsuspecting person into a prank.

"Gathering a few others! We're having a game of truth or dare in the forest."

Annabeth stopped trying to reach Percy and waded back to shore. "Why in the forest?" she asked, wringing out her clothes at the same time. Percy followed her to land warily.

Connor grinned wider. "It adds danger. Plus, what if one of us dares the other to kill a monster or something? It's also the best place to hide from Chiron so he doesn't know what we're doing…" he stopped as he saw the look Annabeth was giving him. "Heh heh… I mean, the place where we won't disturb anyone?" he corrected sheepishly.

Annabeth rolled her eyes. "Fine, we'll be there in a few minutes." She glared at Percy as he gulped.

Connor started edging away. "Right, so… I'll just tell the others that you're coming." He turned quickly and fled.

Annabeth turned back to Percy, hair dripping down her shirt, while her eyes told the tale. She grinned triumphantly, having blocked him from reaching the water.

"Sorry?" he tried. Her glare turned mischievous. His eyes widened. "Please don't kill me?" he begged.

Annabeth took off, chasing him towards the forest while yelling at him. "I will get you Percy!" she called. No matter how fast she went, he was able to keep the distance between them safe.

He yelled over his shoulder. "I just splashed you with some water!" He looked where he was running just in time to avoid crashing into Clarisse. He bounded out of the way and hit a tree before falling to the ground.

"Watch where you're going, prissy!" she shouted to him.

"Yeah, yeah." he muttered as he stood up slowly. When Annabeth reached him she gave him a good smack on the head.

The three walked over to the rest of the group, who were sitting in a small circle. Travis and Connor wore identical smirks that made everyone want to check for their possessions. Clarisse grumbled as she sat next to Nico, who was sitting in the shadow of a short tree.

Percy and Annabeth sat in between Clarisse and Connor. "Who wants to go first?" asked Travis when everyone was settled.

Annabeth volunteered. "Travis, truth or dare?" He thought for a moment while stroking his imaginary beard. "A tough decision, really, but I believe I shall go with dare." Annabeth rolled her eyes, but thought of a good dare.

Annabeth smiled, making Travis wonder if he should've picked truth. "Travis, I dare you to wear a target on your head and have Percy shoot an arrow at you." Travis frowned. "But… what if the arrow goes through the target?" he asked. "It won't get within any worrisome distance of your head," she replied. "Percy is the worst with a bow and arrow that anyone here has ever seen, which says a lot, considering we have Chiron."

Annabeth, Percy and Travis headed to the weapons shed to grab a bow and arrows for Percy, while Travis taped a target to his forehead. They ran back to the forest before anyone saw them.

Annabeth showed Percy how to hold a bow so that he wouldn't drop it. He pulled back on the string with the arrow held badly between two fingers and let it fly. The arrow sailed above Travis' head and disappeared into a group of trees.

Percy dropped the bow. "Oops. I'll try to find it," he said. Annabeth smiled. "Ha, told you he wouldn't get it anywhere near you!" Travis let out a breath of relief. "Yeah, I knew that."

Percy came back without the arrow.

"I couldn't find the arrow. I searched all around, but it's getting too dark to really see anything well."

Annabeth looked up, surprised at the time. "We should probably head back before a harpy eats us." Everyone agreed, and a new time was set up to play the next day, at the same place. Annabeth took the target and the bow back to the shed with Percy.

"We can find the arrow tomorrow when we play again," she said. Percy nodded. "We'll be able to see better, anyway," he agreed.

When they reached the cabins, they each said goodnight to each other before heading off to their respective cabins. They were asleep as soon as their heads hit the pillow.

Meanwhile, the pomegranate tree grew steadily higher. It embraced the darkening sky. The feeling of darkness comforted it, for the darkness is where it belonged. The tree doubled its efforts, the fruits hanging on the branches swelled and grew, waiting to be eaten.

The plant had waited for the dark to come eagerly, focusing all of the energy on the small red fruits. The tree could not think for itself, so it could not wonder what the fruit could do to one who ate it. What would it do if it could comprehend that what it grew on its branches was the near equivalent to sweet poison?

But, in its effort to thrive, the tree would not care for anyone else. Someone who falls grabs the person next to them by instinct after all, even though they know it will bring them down too.


	3. Eating the Pomegranate

Disclaimer: I know, I own nothing. It's just sad.

Percy and Annabeth were the first ones to arrive back at the truth or dare 'meeting point.' Travis and Connor were not too far behind, but seemed to be running from something. When Percy asked them what was up, Connor replied, having recovered from laughing and running faster than his brother.

"Poured poison… on Katie's plants… on accident. It was funny, though. Something called Round-Up that she uses for the weeds in the strawberry fields. I think it's a mortal thing. Not sure how she got it in here."

As if on cue, Percy and Annabeth whipped their heads around as an irritated scream ripped through the air, obviously from Katie Gardner of the Demeter cabin. " _STOLLS_!" The brothers turned to each other and high-fived, grinning like Halloween pumpkins.

A rustling in the trees startled all of them, causing them to whip out their weapons. A _very_ manly scream cut through the air as a black _something_ fell through the air from about forty feet up. The black something landed directly on top of Percy, who flung his arms out to the side in a fruitless effort to keep himself standing. One arm took Travis out and the other smacked Connor in the face, sending him flying into a tree.

Off of a groaning Percy stepped an irritated, scratched-up but otherwise unharmed Nico who started muttering to himself about that _'darn, lousy, unreliable shadow travel.'_

Annabeth chuckled to herself before hauling her flattened boyfriend to his feet, leaving the Stolls to fend for themselves.

"Clarisse isn't coming." Nico muttered quietly, as though to himself. "Yelled something about not wanting to waste valuable training time acting like a kindergartener with in a group full of wimps." Connor started laughing, but quickly realized he was the only one. Pause. "Wait, was she talking about _us?_ " Travis, ignoring his brother, realized something. "Wait, was that girly, high-pitched squeal I heard coming from _you?_ The mighty Nico DiAngelo squealing like a little girl? HAHAAA!" He was bent over laughing, following the example of his brother, who had started halfway through his speech.

Nico clenched his fists. "Not if you want to live," he replied creepily. The Stolls stopped laughing.

Annabeth suddenly seemed to have a lightbulb moment. Travis and Connor hoped it was something to diffuse the tension. Annabeth turned to Percy, who seemed to be doing better now that he had recovered from being a human pillow. "Percy, aren't you going to find the arrow? I think it's that way." She pointed vaguely in the direction the thought the arrow had flown the night before. Percy nodded and walked off in the direction she had indicated.

Annabeth turned to the other three, who had apparently been watching their interaction. "we'll wait for him to come back," she decided. Nico nodded and sat down in some shade by the tree he was leaning against the day before. Annabeth wondered if she should go with Percy or watch the Stolls.

Pathetic, really. The Stolls acted as though they were five years old. If they were left alone in New York, a bank in Florida could find all their cash taken within two days, factoring in the amount of time it would take to fly there and back on a few Pegasi. Nico, however, acted his age. That is, about eighty. He could probably take over his father's kingdom for a day and be totally fine. He looked like the kind of guy who would love the opportunity to torture bad people. She shivered momentarily, then looked around to make sure nobody noticed.

Before she could make her decision, however, she heard Percy calling them from the forest. "HEY! Guys, come check this out!"

* * *

 ** _With Percy_**

Percy walked in the direction that Annabeth pointed to for a while. Everywhere he looked was a mirror image of itself. Everything was brown and… full of sticks? …sticky? Ha! That would make a good joke. Oh, wait, that was already invented. Darn.

Finally. after wandering around in the eternity that was probably only two minutes in reality, Percy remembered that the arrow had a red feather thingy on the end. It was a… fledgling _? No, that's a baby bird. Something like that… a … fletching!_ Anyway, Percy decided to climb a tree to get a better look. He climbed to about twenty feet before looking for anything red.

There! The arrow was at the base of a tree not too far from their truth or dare meeting place. The tree also seemed to hold something red, and sort of looked like apples. However, it was not an apple tree. He didn't get a good look though because the tree decided that his time standing on one of its many arms was up. The branch fell, forcing Percy to copy Nico's earlier move. He fell to the ground without much noise because he was low enough not to have time to yell.

He groaned and rolled over, mentally deciding that he did not need any more high-speed impacts today. Percy pushed himself up and walked over to where he had seen the arrow. He was sure he had seen that tree somewhere, maybe the Stolls could identify it. They did spend quite a bit of time around Katie. They seemed to split their time halfway between spying on Katie and pranking her. Especially Travis. Huh, wonder why?

Finally, he came to the spot where the arrow rested. It had buried itself in between the roots of the strange tree. Percy took out Riptide and cut away the stem of one of the fruits. Maybe he could identify the fruit by what was on the inside. He sliced it open. Inside were sections of small red seeds connected to a weird whitish stuff.

He pulled the arrow out absent-mindedly while he thought about where he could possibly have heard of this fruit before. "HEY! Guys, come check this out!" he yelled. He poked at the red seeds. They seemed alright to him.

He turned, just as Travis and Connor jogged up beside him, looking at the fruit in his hands.

"Where are Annabeth and Nico?" he asked the two. Connor answered. "Annabeth went to look for Nico. She'll be here in a few minutes…" "If she can't find him," Travis finished.

Connor looked back to the fruit. "Are we still playing truth or dare?"

Percy shrugged, unsure of how he should answer. "Um, sure?" he replied, but it sounded more like a question. Travis matched his brother's evil grin. "I dare you to eat one."

Percy may not have the best memory, but he knew from having to cross the country before that you should NOT eat fruit you randomly find unless you know what it is. He asked the brothers if they knew.

"Oh, it's a pomegranate. Don't worry, it won't eat you." Connor snickered quietly as if he had told a hilarious joke. Percy scanned their faces, and shrugged deciding to eat it. However, the conch horn that signaled lunch had other plans.

The Stolls sighed unhappily, but Percy just popped one quickly into his mouth, showing them that he was not afraid to eat the fruit. He tossed the rest of the fruit into the woods. None of the things that lived in the woods ate plants anyway. Quickly, Travis, Connor and Percy ran in the direction the conch horn sound came from. On the way, they met up with Annabeth, who told them that she had given up on trying to find Nico. He would be found when he wanted to be. Nothing really unusual happened at lunch, and the day seemed to promise an uneventful night.


End file.
